Distraction by a medical clown is helpful in children undergoing blood tests or line insertion. Although pain reduction was better with EMLA, both duration of cry and anxiety were lower with a medical clown. These results strongly encourage and support the utilization of medical clowns while drawing blood in children.

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The prevalence of fear of clowns in the general pediatric hospitalized population was 1.2%, with a significant predominance of girls (85.7%). Children who experienced significant fear of clowns also experienced significant fear of encountering or thinking about a MC visit. Fear of clowns can affect children at any age (range 1-15), any ethnicity, religion, or degree of illness. Further large scale studies are required to better understand this unique phenomenon of fear of clowns. What is Known: • Fear of clowns is a phenomenon known for more than several decades and related to the increased use of clowns as negative characters in horror movies and TV shows. • The increased use of medical clowns in hospital wards and corridors increases the significance of defining and characterizing this phenomenon in hospital wards. What is New: • The study is novel by giving new data related to the extent of fear of clowns in pediatrics wards and giving demographic characteristic of children experiencing fear of clowns.

Aimed at examining serum glucose and electrolytes concentrations in adolescents with acute alcohol intoxication (AAI) on admission to the pediatric Emergency Department (ED), a retrospective unmatched, case-control study was conducted. Two cohorts of adolescents were compared, patients presenting with AAI and patients presenting with non-alcohol intoxication. The study group included ED patients aged 12-18 years with AAI. The control group included ED patients aged 12-18 years who had poisoning from a non-illicit drug. Demographic characteristics and glucose and electrolyte blood levels were extracted from the medical files. The records of patients who were admitted between January 2007 and December 2009 were analyzed. The study group and the control group included 106 subjects and 27 subjects, respectively. The study subjects had serum ethanol levels in the range of 55.6-297 mg/dL. No case of hypoglycemia was recorded. The study subjects had higher glucose levels and lower potassium levels compared to the controls (p < 0.005 and p < 0.0001, respectively). No such difference was found when the levels of sodium and bicarbonate were compared (p = 0.3 and p = 0.14, respectively). In conclusion, the findings of this study suggest that at presentation to the ED adolescents with AAI are at low risk for hypoglycemia.